meet the counseling staff

Marina Chatterton, Director of Counseling Services
Marina Talley Chatterton, LCSW is a licensed psychotherapist with over 15 years of experience working in the mental health field. She graduated from Smith College School for Social Work in 1996, and completed a post-graduate fellowship in College Mental Health at Harvard University in 1997. She has worked as a therapist at Pratt Institute and Sarah Lawrence College, and moved to San Francisco to become Director of Counseling Services at SFAI in 2006. As field faculty, she trains graduate students from Smith and UC Berkeley, and has a private practice in San Francisco. Particular interests include: psychodynamic psychotherapy, group and organizational dynamics, professional identity development, and cross-cultural challenges.

Shannon Yambasky, Counseling Intern
Shannon Yambasky is a second-year graduate student from Smith College School for Social Work in Northampton, Massachusetts. She received her BA from San Francisco State University in Psychology with a minor in holistic health. As a social work intern she has worked in clinical case management for a San Francisco-based outpatient mental health clinic. Other prior experience includes working in juvenile detention centers as a mentor and counselor, facilitating art therapy, and job readiness skills groups for homeless women, and working with an afterschool creative writing programs for at-risk youth. Professional interests include trauma and substance abuse counseling, along with women’s issues. Her non-professional interests: include cooking, baking, and camping.

Gabrielle Holder, Counselor
Gabrielle Holder, ACSW has been working with children, adolescents and young adults for over 18 years in a wide range of capacities from educator to travel leader to admissions and diversity work and now as a clinical therapist. As a clinical therapist since 2003, she has worked in independent schools in NYC and SF and also in private practice.  She maintains a strengths based ideology, helping clients delve deeper into areas of challenge in their lives, and identifying their strengths as a way to initiate change and work towards understanding, resolution and goals.  Specialties include depression and anxiety, normal life adjustment and transitions, relationships, feeling stuck and a lack of fulfillment in life.  Beyond her professional training, she is also an avid long distance runner, admirer of art, cook, and has lived in other countries.